Understanding
by AutumnsFey
Summary: Tsuna comes to a very bitter realisation, one he hadn't expected - and one, while necessary to become healthy again, in some ways breaks him worse than the bullying at school ever did. Warning: Eating Disorder!


_**Authors Note 1. Concerning Triggers: Please don't read if you are triggered by Eating Disorders, Signs of Depression or Child Neglect/Abuse**_

**It was quiet startling to realize that he didn't actually knew the exact moment in time, the event or even emotion that defined the beginning of his deepest regret. **For all that this disorder dominated his life in ways that were near crippling, he had subconsciously just accepted it as there. Existing. The phrase "Whatever, so what" sprung to mind, and it sickened him. Sickened him to realise that even now, a small part of him was content to let it slide, a knee-jerk reaction, long ingrained. Somehow, the question of "how", "why" or "when" had never been posed before, and so he never had spared it a thought.

There was never a reason to … until suddenly, there was.

And Tsuna had to admit … that he didn't know the trigger point. He actually didn't even knew that it was a problem until his friends (his family in all but blood) had very clearly and desperately pointed that, for them, very distressing fact out and forced him into treatment after nearly going crazy with worry being forced to witness his decline.

So, now, here he was, staring blankly at his bedroom ceiling and contemplating the question today's therapy session had brought forth.

When did his eating disorder start?

_**He was fifteen and starting his last leg of the journey into adulthood – High School. **__And High School, well, it was not only infinitely more mean-spirited and competitive than Middle School but it also paved the way for his future, and despite his former, rather lacklustre attitude concerning academics, he actually wanted to do well at school. He wanted a chance – one, that had zero to do with the Mafia. So, no._

_While fifteen was a highly stressful year, it didn't bring new unhealthy habits, it instead merely … encouraged pre-existing ones._

_No trigger, there._

_Just accelerating._

_**Thirteen was another year during which he was brought nearly beyond the limits of his sanity.**_

_It was the year chaos moved in – more commonly known as Reborn._

_And suddenly, danger was a commodity. Fear, anxiety, despair and death were nothing that came and went – it stayed. With it came the fights, the trials and tribulations no teenager should have to endure. But Tsuna preserved._

_And not everything about the situation was inherently bad._

_Hayato._

_Takeshi._

_Lambo._

_Onii-san._

_Kyouya._

_Mukuro._

_Chrome._

_Bianchi._

_Shamal._

_I-Pin._

_Fuuta._

_Dino._

_Spanner._

_Shoichi._

_Xanxus. Squalo. Lussuria. Belphegor. Levi._

_Mammon. Skull. Lal. Colonello. Verde. Fon._

_Yuni._

_Even Byakuran._

_The Shimon – Enma. Adelheid._

_The … the Famiglia._

… _and Reborn._

_Reborn, who spoke of tutoring him but was incapable to difference between tutor and torturer. Reborn, who despite the pain his arrival hailed for Tsuna, was always there for him, who guided him phenomenally unsubtly to the people who would become his cherished family and friends. The anchors of his heart and mind._

_Reborn, who became unwillingly more of a father to him than his own could ever hope to be._

… _this, in itself, was terribly sad._

_A stranger who never even tried had replaced his father, who each time they saw each other proclaimed his unparalleled love for wife and son. But in the end, the man who never tried to be a father to Tsuna, did in a few months more for him than the man who spawned him did in fifteen years._

_But no. Back on track._

_Reborn had brought many terrible firsts into Tsuna's life, yeas, undeniably, but the difficulties with food? They already existed._

_His rips were easily countable a long time before the tutor from hell darkened their door steps. His hips jutted out like cutting glass years ago. His spine was terrifyingly visible when he was … maybe … eleven? Ten? No matter, it wasn't anything new._

_Reborn stole his food? He lamented, loudly, whimpered and moaned. It was what was expected. What thirteen year old wouldn't. But … he didn't actually try to steal it back. He put up a very convincing façade, until the act became a routine, and within a routine, one could be more lax than normally._

_Violence turned his stomach and made him puke his insides out? Expected. He needed to handle it by himself, become tougher, stronger. No need for anyone to see the blood mixed within the acid escaping his empty belly._

_Food avoidance._

_Purging._

… _old acquaintances._

**Tsuna laid one arm over his eyes to blend out comforting glow of dying daylight.**

Introspection was a bitch, and his dry throat itched to release sobs – sobs, tears, the futile screams he had always swallowed. Allowing the memories to well up was every bit as painful and traumatizing as he had feared, but at least it brought the unavoidable clarity that while teenage-hood and the burden of being forced into the role of the chosen heir to the greatest Mafia Family in Italy compounded the problem – they weren't it's source.

Reborn wasn't the source.

Neither were his friends. His chosen family.

And that surety released a crushing stone-weight from his heart he hadn't even known was there.

His true father figure was chaos.

But he was a chaos that destroyed enemies and protected his chosen cherished … a small group Reborn had admitted Tsuna belonged.

Somehow, despite the burning behind his eye lids and the despair lodged in his throat, he had to smile.

Shaky, maybe.

But it was a smile.

**Wherein, then, lied the reason?**

When did it begin?

And why?

_**Twelve was a terrible age.**_

_Tsuna finished Elementary School with twelve and Kaa-chan despaired that he would be held back a year. His grades had never been great, rather the opposite, and his lack of friends was quiet damning evidence to the proficiency of his social skills. So yeah, it's not a time he liked to think back on._

_During that school year, he had been plagued with dizziness, nausea and a disconcerting lack of focus, the ability to concentrate fleeting at best. There had been so many days he had buckled down to learn, devoured books only to barely remember their content, the throbbing in his head drowning everything else out. No matter how well he had prepared, the fear of failure inevitably rose to unbearable heights before tests and he couldn't help vomiting. It became tradition. Ritual. Reflex._

_He started wearing long shirts or jumpers that year, after one of his bullies remarked before the whole class, mockingly, that Tsuna's wrists were thinner than the other boy's younger sister's._

_Mhm …_

_Tsuna tended to deny that this year even happened. It was erased from his mind._

_It, also, was the year he started to purposefully purge._

_First, it was nerves. A physical reaction. But then, it was about control. Comfort. Familiarity. About the calm that would, for only moments, settle about him once he had successfully purged himself of what little he had managed to eat that day. It was the one thing he controlled._

_It became … his._

_His alone._

… **right …**

Tsuna remembered. The nervous nausea started with twelve. The purging as well.

Hell, it had been so freaking easy to use his fingers, thrust them down his throat, and … well, it had been too easy.

He had only ever choked twice – the first and only time he tried to use a tooth brush, and the time after that, when he had tried his fingers.

… not something to be proud of, and, looking back, the ease, despite choking, he had that first time purging, should have been a big red warning sign.

It wasn't.

He had already been gone too far.

_**It … didn't happen during Elementary School.**_

_The triggering, that was._

_No._

_He was certain of that._

_Yes._

_He was bullied. By his peers. By older students. Even by teachers. … in a certain way, even by his parents._

_But it was gradual._

_He had so often forgotten his bento, from first grade on, and it didn't have a sudden negative effect. Often he didn't even notice until his so-called peers started to mock him. At that point, his clothes had already been loose. He was already known for his shy, passive and submissive character, a child easily pushed over. No one wondered over his bruises and cuts, over his bad grades._

_No one blinked an eye when the moniker 'Dame-Tsuna' was born._

… _and that hurt._

_That hurt more than he had ever admitted before._

**Tsuna blinked as he lifted his hand over his head, stretching his arm and splaying his fingers wide.**

How … strange.

Somehow, he had expected his memories to expose the trigger during his school years. A particular bullying incident, a certain situation that had changed his view on existential facts, something trivial that accidentally impacted him negatively …

Nothing.

But then … how particular.

He had always seen himself as a happy carefree child. Easily frightened and kind of wimpy, but nevertheless cheerful and happy.

That wasn't a lie.

There was nothing extraordinary in his early childhood. Nothing which could explain …

Tsuna blinked again.

And paled.

Nothing …

Nothing which 'should' explain.

But … something did happen.

Fuck.

… it did.

_**Tsunayoshi was five.**_

_He was a cheerful, energetic and kind child._

_And an accidental freight activated his flames, his pure powerful sky flames while his father and adopted grandfather were visiting._

_Flames, which his Nonno Nono sealed on Tsuna's Tou-chan's demand. And after the sealing, they left._

_Behind them, ignored, a traumatized child._

_A child that stopped laughing._

_Stopped playing with others._

_Stopped feeling whole and sane in his own body._

_A body thrown into absolute discord._

_There was a terrible devouring emptiness left behind._

_One that consumed everything._

_Every motivation. Every ambition. Every pleasure._

_Until everything became a dull shore._

_Playing. Talking. School._

_Even eating became a shore._

_And Tsuna didn't care for it._

**Grandpa …**

Dad …

Why?

**He barely reached the bathroom before his meagre dinner made an appearance.**

Oh Kami-sama.

That … that …

Fuck!

He threw up, again.

The sealing.

It was the fucking sealing. The sealing he hadn't even known about, hadn't been aware was affecting him, until the Ninth had released it when he was barely thirteen. The sealing of his Dying Will Flames …

Tsuna knew that it had affected his ability to think and concentrate, even his clumsiness could partially be attributed to it, but …

Fuck.

The sealing had caused him to lose his … appetite. And once he had gotten used to the new normal, the whole fucked-up thing had snow-balled.

And he knew, he knew that he was right. His intuition screamed at him, screamed at him that this was the trigger he had locked for … and that the betrayal he felt was the reason he had never considered it before. Everything else he could have rationalized, but that his own family, his flesh and blood, adults he should love and trust …

How freaking mental was that?

His father and his grandfather were the ones to trigger Tsuna's eating disorder – and no one knew it, because it happened at such a young age that the signs couldn't be read – hell, no one had known that there were even signs to read. At that age, children were still developing in strange ways, still malleable and flexible. Who knows how a child could change in the span of a few days? It just needed the right circumstances to provoke that change. And with an obvious airheaded mother like his own, who lived in her perfect little bubble of contentedness?

It hurt.

And it hurt so more, knowing how his father had reacted to the news that Tsuna had an eating disorder.

He had been summarily told to man up.

Man up.

Tsuna swallowed a hysterical giggle and collapsed boneless on the floor, feverish.

Tears dripped down his cheeks as he laid there.

What a fucked-up situation.

**He knew that he looked like a baby panda.**

Lambo's remark was spectacularly unhelpful.

But after a hellish night of revelation like that … of finally knowing ... Tsuna actually felt more than entitled to it. Reborn's sharp dark-eyed gaze following his every move was also quiet disconcerting. Normally, while being watched by his home tutor wasn't anything especially noteworthy, the disconcertingly intent watching seemed more reserved for the moments he had to undergo tests and trials, or … earlier meal times. This staring, which followed his every move, made an itch form between his narrow shoulders.

Tsuna studiously avoided the dark knowing gaze.

It had been eerie and bad coming from the hitman's chibified form – but from the intimidating adult he had returned to after the Rainbow Representative battles?

Downright terrifying.

Swallowing tightly, he sat down at the table and looked at the breakfast his Kaa-chan had provided.

The rice and grilled fish hadn't looked this unappetizing in months. Bile rose as he turned away from the meal.

He blinked, quickly.

„ Tsuna-nii?", sounded Lambo's soft questioning voice from the left.

… an undertone of fear coloured the child's tone, and it made Tsuna's throat constrict, knowing he was the reason that Lambo knew how to be afraid _for_ someone.

His little brother shouldn't know so intimately how that felt. It shouldn't come so naturally to the young boy to be afraid whenever Tsuna acted he slightest bit off.

Fuck.

Tsuna blinked, and blinked again.

Nope.

His vision was still dotted with black spots. Shaking his head slightly, Tsuna reached out and tousled Lambo's curly hair. No need to worry his younger brother even more.

… he had already brought enough sorrow into their growing family.

So much sorrow

Such a burden he was.

„ Everything is okay, Lambo-kun. I'm just a bit tired."

Well, an all-nighter always did this to him. And taking his already fragile constitution into account, it was no wonder that he felt nauseous, dizzy … and decidedly faint.

No wonder at all.

„ Tsuna-nii is really okay?", the eight-year-old asked sceptically.

Tsuna smiled shakily.

… yeah, not convincing anyone. Even his Kaa-chan grimaced, and she had, as of late, stayed mostly silent. The reaming out Reborn had given her, after Tsuna had been admitted to the hospital, still echoed in the house, and the usually amicable atmosphere was strained.

„ I'm okay", he insisted, standing up slowly. „ I'm going to lie down for a bit."

The dizziness grew, and Tsuna took an inconspicuous hold of the table to steady himself.

Reborn spoke up, then.

„ Not before you eat something", the hitman commanded sternly.

Tsuna studiously avoided looking at the meal provided.

„ Later", he promised.

„ Now."

„ I'll eat it later."

„ Tsunayoshi."

The sharp tone made him flinch.

" You will not leave this table until you have eaten every last piece. Sit. Down."

Tsuna straightened up, ready to counter the demand, which turned out to be a mistake. The movement made his vision black out completely , and before he knew it, his legs gave out beneath him.

A buzz filled his ears.

The last thing he remembered before all sense fled him was Lambo's panicked cry and Kaa-chan's surprised shriek.

And the feeling of familiar arms catching him.

**Coming to was never pleasant.**

Light, burning though his eye lids. Still day.

Sounds, coming on so sudden, but muffled. His brain taking it's time to reboot and comprehend.

Taste, well … his mouth felt as if a scorpion had used it as a nesting place, and it tasted just as … unappealing. Ugh.

He hated waking up after fainting.

But the hand carding through his hair was nice.

… hand?

Pausing, Tsuna slowly blinked up – and froze.

He was looking at his bedroom ceiling, lying on his back and his head was bedded on something soft and warm.

What …?

" You fainted, Dame-Tsuna."

He flinched.

Reborn's face came into his view upside down, wearing a reprimanding frown.

Ah … damn.

" I – I … I k-know", he croaked painfully.

The frown deepened.

" Why did you throw up yesterday?"

That, actually, made Tsuna stop and look closer at his tutor.

Reborn wasn't an easy person to read, quite the opposite actually, but Tsuna had been his student for nearly three years now, and what was normally hidden underneath the sheer force the hitman exuded was ridiculously obvious to Tsuna.

Once he knew where to look, Reborn was an open book.

Beyond the reprimand and annoyed displeasure, there was worry. A deep concern the man expressed in demands and hard inquiries.

But those dark worried eyes, and the familiar hand still threading through his hair so calmingly and tenderly told a different story.

" I wasn't purging", he promised earnestly, looking his tutor squarely in the eye.

If you are convinced of the truth, stand by it, and know when to be unmoveable or malleable to get that point across. It was a lesson of Reborn's he had taken to heart.

Dark eyes surveyed him intently.

" Then why?"

Tsuna took a deep breath.

There was only one answer with Reborn: the truth.

" Yesterday", he began, haltingly, before he steeled himself.

Reborn. It was Reborn.

Reborn who wouldn't judge him for this.

And even if he did, he wouldn't just disappear. Reborn was the only male role model in his life that had never abandoned him.

Tsuna … trusted him with more than just his life.

He trusted this man, who was more of a father to him than his biological one, with his greatest treasure. With the one thing he couldn't survive loosing.

His cherished ones.

" During yesterday's therapy session, Takada-sensei posed a question I couldn't answer. It was an important one, and he said I needed to think about it and to know the answer so we could move forward. That is what I did yesterday, searching my memories."

Tsuna couldn't meet Reborn's gaze.

" He asked me when I stopped eating."

For a moment, silence reigned.

" And you couldn't answer it."

The sentence was delivered in a flat toneless voice.

Tsuna bit his lip.

He could taste the fury in Reborn's flames …

" I had … never actually thought about it."

Reborn's eyes were shadowed and his hand stiffened for a moment.

" Did you find your answer?"

Tsuna's fingers twitched involuntarily.

" … yes ..."

For a moment, neither of them spoke.

Then, slowly, Tsuna reached with his hand to clutch at the fabric of Reborn's pants as he turned his face away from that intense expression the other wore.

He could feel the burn of tears in the corners of his eyes.

Reborn didn't probe … and that was what gave Tsuna the courage to speak the words aloud that had been repeating in his head since the night before.

They tasted like ash in his mouth.

" I was five when Nono sealed my flame. Five. And he sealed me. You know what it did to me, Reborn", Tsuna whispered brokenly. " You saw how I changed once the seal was completely gone. Concentration, intelligence, self-respect … hell, the artificial discord in my soul caused those in close contact with me to go into disharmony – and they took the disability to connect with someone so lacking out on the one that made them feel that way. But most of all – it took my motivation."

A bitter smile crossed his lips.

" All my motivation."

A harsh inhale and the complete stilling of the hand above him was all the confirmation he needed to know that Reborn understood.

And wasn't understanding just a cruel bitch.

" How?!", Tsuna asked suddenly, and sat up, ignoring how the edges of his vision immediately was dusted in black spots.

" How could they do this?!", he demanded again, a desperate hollow rage unlike any other he had ever experienced fuelling him.

Reborn watched him with unfathomable hooded eyes.

" Tell me how, Reborn", Tsuna demanded, breathless, as his hands grabbed the comforter. " Tell me how the man I regard as my grandfather could do this. How … how …", he broke, his head bowed. " How could my own father do this to me?!"

It burned.

That kind of … betrayal burned him from within. He breathed harshly, his chest aching even as he pressed one hand to it.

For years, eating less and less, purging, ignoring his health, all those little habits had come easily and turned into normal behaviour. He had never seen anything wrong with the way he ate, because it had been going on for so fucking long, he just didn't know better. Not until his mentor, his new family and friends, had pointed it out and forced help onto him - help, he realised somehow along the way, he needed.

Desperately.

He needed to become better to have a future with his family.

To see Lambo grow up.

To see Hayato find his perfect UMA.

To see Takeshi reach his true potential.

To see Onii-san find inner peace.

To see Mukuro let go of his hate.

To see Chrome find her own happiness.

To see Kyouya smile with everyone else.

To … to see his small family, grow, bloom, and thrive.

He wanted to be there.

To see it. To experience it. To enjoy it.

He wanted it so badly.

And on his father's whim, by his grandpa's hand, thanks to his own ignorance and complacency, his chance of that imperfectly perfect Happy Ever After had nearly been taken.

Why …?

Fingers brushed over his cheeks and Tsuna stared at Reborn as he realised that they were wet. He was crying.

" Don't call him father."

" Reborn ..."

" No."

His chin was taken in a tight grasp.

" You, Sawada Tsunayoshi, will not take the blame for any of this. The ones to share and be blamed are the blonde idiota and the Ninth, and trust me", the hitman growled." I will be having words with them."

Tsuna didn't doubt him for a second.

And while he knew that Reborn's words weren't completely true and didn't absolve him of his own part in this, it was nice to have someone actually give a damn about him …

" You are my student. The only one allowed to tort-tutor you am I."

At that, Tsuna released a watery laugh and sunk forward even as strong arms embraced him and a hand cupped the back of his head, tugging his face against that strong, safe chest.

" Idiot-student, they are not family. Your family cares for you, and you will recover, stronger and better than ever before, with your Famiglia right next to you. No arguing."

He closed his eyes.

" Even you?", he whispered.

A questioning hum was returned.

He specified. " Will you be here, too?"

' Will you be my family, too, padre? If I'm not to call Iemitsu father, will you take up the mantle?'

Snorting, Reborn delivered a sharp tap to his head.

" Dame-Tsuna. That's what I said. Start listening", the hitman scolded, but his warm voice spoke of something else.

Tsuna smiled a little brighter.

Yes, it hurt. Understanding hurt. But it was also healing. Maybe this was a step forward. And no matter how much it broke him, it would never shatter him. With his family on his side, he would recover, better and stronger than before.

He wasn't alone.

Not at all.

_~ The End. To be continued in: 'Consequences'. ~_

_**Authors Note 2. Concerning Tsuna: He doesn't allow this revelation to absolve himself of not seeing that something was wrong, but when the thing that's wrong is never addressed, and acknowledged as such, when it's been happening for a long time, it is difficult to see and understand such destructive behaviours in one self. And in this story, Tsuna's eating Disorder was caused by the Sealing, so he actually couldn't help himself. What happened later on is a downward spiral. It's the possible thought process of a teenager.**_


End file.
